Slashdot Mirror
Hosting Provider Shut Down By FBI
An Anonymous Reader writes: "An 80-strong U.S. FBI agents raided the Texas-based host of Arabic Web sites, including that of the Arab world's leading independent news channel, prompting charges on Thursday of an 'anti-Muslim witchhunt.'" The Reuters story is at Yahoo! as well. Did you know there was a North Texas Joint Terrorism Task Force, or that it would be shutting down ISPs?
Imagine if an FBI raid on CNN resulting in the broadcaster going off the air for a few hours, or the website being shut down.
I think there's some bias here.
Sure, they probably have a search warrant. Sure, it's probably warranted. But this wouldn't be the first news organization had some information the police wanted or needed, and didn't hand it over. Journalists have these crazy ideas about protecting their sources, and don't always willingly give the police what they want.
But still, if it were a western mainstream media organization the police would be careful not to disrupt operations.
I think there must be some bias here.
Their operations were simply interrupted while the Fed's conducted their search. The sites came back online, fair and square.
...
The search was perfectly legal, and executed per the law.
For crying out loud, glib sensationalism is the last thing slashdot needs more of
Shame!
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
While the fourth amendment may not have been violated due to the fact that there was a valid search warrant, this kind of tactic sounds like classic 'silencing' to me. The warrant was sealed, right? Why were the offices raided? The quote in the reuters story from the owner indicated that he seemed to think that his news outlets were being targeted for being related to terrorist groups. There was *no* firm reason for the raid given.
Sounds very totalitarian, doesn't it?
As a Texan, I'm rather upset that we have a 'anti-terrorism force' at all! Hevean help me if I started to express anti-American views on my website!
The next Slashdot story will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and slashdot the links early!
Well, this is an interesting situation:
We have the FBI, who I don't trust.
We have the Arabic news sources, who I also don't trust.
The FBI is denying any kind of bias whatsoever, and that the investigation is totally unrelated to terrorist concerns, anti-palestinian, anti-muslim, or anti anything else.
Still, until we have any better information (which I'm looking forward to) this amounts to a very short period of Government sponsored hacktivism (okay, it's arguable how much hacktivism is involved when the G-men come in and take you offline, but it's the same result as geeks taking down opressors and terrorists sites on the other side of the world.)
Found some news clips.
Anti-terrorism agents raid Texas Internet business
FBI Raids Muslim Businesses, Charity Organizations
FBI Raids Dallas-Area Web Business
http://www.wfaa.com/wfaa/articledisplay/0,1002,310 13,00.html 1 20,00.html
http://www.wfaa.com/wfaa/articledisplay/0,1002,31
This reminds me so much of the Steve Jackson Games raid of a decade ago. Yes, the warrant was valid. And sealed. The effect was to nearly silence a voice the SS didn't like.
1Alpha7
Live to be Moderated
And the search was probably justified. Muslim
terrorist groups use fronts disguised as charities
to move money around, and the Holy Land Foundation
has long been suspected of being a financial front
for Hamas. Since HLF uses the Web to collect
donations by way of credit cards, a search of the
Web hosting company is legit.
Where's the "-1: Self-Indulgent Posing" option?
/. If the government wants us to respect the law, it should set a better example.
What kind of shit is this? If you're going to be violating people's property and impeding commerce, you'd better have a damn valid reason that will stand up to public scrutiny. Otherwise, we might as well get rid of trial by jury, the pesky fifth amendment or the obligation to prove one's guilt before issuing a sentence. Yeah, that's the ticket, just like in those documentaries about the Third Reich that must be the talk of the town in Quantico nowadays.
This makes me sick.
Frankly, this doesn't surprise me. George W. Bush and his administration have no problem with you being a different skin color, economic/social class, sexual orientation, etc. as long as you act like them. I'm not saying the Dems are better, but at least there's some indicator from them that you don't have to goosestep to their march exactly the way the Republicans do...
I'm seriously thinking of moving to Canada until the Shrub presidency is over if this type of action is going to become commonplace. I definitely don't want to raise my children (who will be European/Filipino) in an environment that the Bush Clan seems to think ideal if that environment means silencing dissent and allowing banks to close accounts based on religious views...
The Hindu Unity website incident is a very different situation. The site had some strong anti-Muslim views, particularly towards Muslims in India. Stuff that could be interpereted as a call for violence against Muslims in India (the current home page has a cartoon of Muslims stabbing to death a Hindu mother). And people complained to the ISP, who told the organization to take their business elsewhere. Here is an article.
The case of the ISP in Texas involves the government shutting down, albeit temporarily and as an incidental consequence of searching for evidence, lots of websites without explanation, only a sealed warrant. This includes one of the most prominent sites news of the middle east that is not controlled by a government of the region.
People get up in arms about controversial websites, like porn sites, hate sites, spammer sites, radical anti-abortion sites, etc, all the time. And sometimes, complaints to the ISP are effective in forcing the site to move to an ISP that is less concerned about complaints from the public. That isn't really news.
The government shutting down 500 mostly arab-related websites without explanation should be considered more newsworthy.
Don't forget that Friday is Hawaiian shirt day.
For all kinds of great info on this topic, read The Hacker Crackdown, by Bruce Sterling. The entire text is available on the web all sorts of places. Like here, for instance. It's an excellent book.